


Sweet Lullaby

by Ahmerst



Category: DRAMAtical Murder - All Media Types
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-06-29
Updated: 2015-06-29
Packaged: 2018-04-06 20:45:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,868
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4236036
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ahmerst/pseuds/Ahmerst
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Stretching his legs on a windy and overcast day, Aoba catches the notes of a familiar voice he never thought he’d hear again.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Sweet Lullaby

**Author's Note:**

> Oh boy, I did this weeks ago and forgot to post it here. This is also a collaboration with the wonderful [Kuma](http://kumaharem.tumblr.com/), so to see her half please [click here.](http://kumaharem.tumblr.com/post/120387057202/sweet-lullaby-the-fanart-fanfic-collab-with)

Go for a walk, they said. It’ll be good for you, they said. So Aoba walked. He walked everyday without fail, shuffling through crowded streets and barely reacting when he bumped into others, through dark alleys with nothing but stray cats and overfilled dumpsters. A year on, he found it didn’t help so much as it left him alone with his thoughts, with what had haunted him to begin with. Flashbacks of the seconds before the end, the screech of brakes and the acrid scent of burning rubber. The shout of his name from his boyfriend’s lips.

The worst was the sickening crunch and the silence that followed. The sight of the person he loved on their side, sprawled artlessly as blood pooled beneath them, face masked by white hair that was quickly staining red. His ribs were wrong─ all wrong. Pushed in like bubble wrap, Aoba’s eyes refusing to take in the sight as an overwhelming numbness consumed him.

He didn’t remember what happened next, his life melting into a depressive, dark blur. By the time the fog started to lift, Aoba’s job was gone. He took it upon himself to become self-employed, a job that consistent mostly of him lying in bed all hours of the day, showering only when reminded, and having no idea what day of the week it was. Or what month, for that matter.

That was when Koujaku and Mizuki had come to the house, coaxing Aoba from his room with hot meals and kind words, dressing him in clean clothes he didn’t recall owning. They managed to get him outside, and he blinked in the glare of the sun, unused to natural light after so long indoors. He walked slowly between Koujaku and Mizuki, unsure of where they were going until he found himself outside the local hospital, the building a sterile and uncomfortable shade of white.

That was when he was told to start walking. To help with the depression, they said. Like it was just that easy.

A year on he was still walking, still thinking. Much of what happened following the accident was a hazy blur. He was sure there must have been an ambulance, though he couldn’t recall it. A service as well, one he hadn’t been able to bring himself to attend. Clear had a grandfather too, but by the time Aoba was well enough to convince himself to return the one belonging of Clear’s he still had, a transparent umbrella, the apartment had new occupants with no idea of where he’d moved to.

Aoba still had the umbrella, even now. It bumped along the ground like a guide cane, tapping without rhythm as he walked, the sky overhead heavy with dark clouds that threatened rain.

It was as Aoba resigned himself to opening the umbrella as the first few droplets of rain sprinkled his skin that he heard it. Clear’s voice, as sweet and resonant as it was the first time Aoba heard it years ago. Aoba laughed to himself, soft and broken at the realization to how far gone his mind must have been to be hearing things now.

It must’ve been worse than he realized, to be hearing Clear’s voice again. From the warmth of his tone to the way the words lilted, sweet as a songbird’s chirp. Aoba tried to shake the sound from his head, umbrella still lowered as he attempted to move through a quickly growing crowd. The further he pushed on, the more people he found, until at last he noticed he was the only one moving, those around him as a standstill with their attention focused in a single direction.

Aoba looked up as he caught what they were so focused on in the corner of his eye.

White hair.

His heart lurched in his chest as he came to a stop, eyes wide and searching as he took in the figure before the crowd.

It was Clear, had to be Clear. With the same washed out white hair and delicate smile, the two pinprick dots of black beneath his lip. But there was a difference now, the skin that Aoba had last seen washed in red was now a stark pale that didn’t entirely mesh with the rest of his appearance. Aoba found himself staring at the change, lips parted in surprise as he listened with the rest of the crowd that gathered.

Aoba hung not on the words Clear sang, but their tone. The low thrum of each note that blended into the next, the warm vibrato of his voice. Clear wasn’t looking at his audience as he sang, his head gently inclined and eyes, bright and pink as Aoba remembered them, searching for something in a space Aoba couldn’t see.

A cold ache gripped at Aoba as his vision blurred, tears springing to the corners of his eyes as he began to ease closer. His lips moved numbly as he mumbled apologies while pushing forward, those around him jostled and displaced. By the time he could see Clear, all of Clear, sitting on a high stool and strumming away, hot tears were rolling down his cheeks, his mouth forming a name he hadn’t allowed himself to speak since the day of the accident.

“Clear,” Aoba called off, soft and choked. He swallowed the lump in his throat as he called out again, sharper and strong. “Clear!”

It hurt to look at him, but it was all Aoba could do.

\---

Clear didn’t remember why his grandpa said they had to move. He didn’t remember the move itself. Or his childhood.

But he did remember lying on his back, wound in bandages and hurting, hurting, _hurting_. When he voiced as much, he heard his grandpa’s voice, far away and hard to hear, telling him not to worry. That it would get better, if only he would rest for a bit and not think about it. Clear listened, because there was nothing more he could do.

When he next woke the pain was still there, but different. No longer did it eat at his ribs and bite at his face with each breath. No, now it was deeper, heavier, colder. It was an absence, and he wasn’t sure of what. He tried to think back, but all he could recall was static and emptiness, a lack of what he once knew. Now he was a body and a name, and if he was more than that before, his grandpa never told him.

Instead, his grandpa told him to stay inside, to still rest, to recover. Clear did as he was told, his days spent inside the small, barely-furnished apartment they lived in, caring for his grandpa in what little ways he could, leaving for necessities only to bring them back along with the extra bits and pieces he found along the way, from empty bottles and discarded cellophane, to broken toys and even a guitar.

He played the guitar for himself, for his grandpa, and when his grandpa passed, Clear played it for people on the street. Not that he was supposed to, but with his grandpa gone he was aimless and lost with no one to guide him. So he guided himself, playing and singing and searching for a way to fill the hollow ache within himself.

That was how he ended up on the stage. Not that it was grand by any means, nothing more than a small platform, one which already had a seat and a microphone. He kept his head low as he strummed his guitar once, twice, then started to play. The first few notes wavered as his tongue flickered over his lips, but soon his fingers were working a familiar song, his voice joining in.

His circuits fired with excitement as his gaze flickered from face to face, taking in each person that stopped to listen. He searched their open expressions for more, for something to click as they watched him. From the crowd he saw a jostling movement, a figure pushing through the people, a flash of blue that came to the front as rain began to sprinkle down.

“Clear,” the figure cried breathlessly.

Clear paused midsong, the next words caught on his tongue. He knew that face, those bright hazel eyes and mess of hair. Those pink lips drawn into a constant pout and the arch of fine eyebrows. Clear’s lips moved to form a name, but his voice offered nothing. He halted in his playing, gears clicking as he licked his lips.

A fan, Clear decided. This man must have been a fan, a familiar face that had sought him out. 

It was then that Clear caught it, movement in the corner of his eye, fast and hurried. His head snapped to the side, heart seizing as he spotted security charging toward him, all sleek black outfits and brawn. He suddenly recalled this stage, this microphone, this attention wasn’t for him, and they had noticed that.

With a start Clear slid from the seat, lugging his guitar onto his back as he looked for a quick escape route. Before him the man who called his name had stopped, eyes wide and rimmed with red, the umbrella at his side remained unopened as the light drizzle turned to a heavy rain. He looked a little like he was crying. Clear really hoped he wasn’t.

“I heard your voice,” the man said, taking a staggered step nearer.

Clear closed the small distance between them, one eye still on security as he took the man’s free hand in his, a spark Clear couldn’t explain running through his mainframe, coolant flooding his veins in an instant as his core temperature flared. He swallowed thickly as he squeezed the man’s hand, his thoughts scrambling in a white static for a moment before streamlining again.

“Thank you,” Clear said. “For coming to see me.”

The man nodded dumbly, and Clear could see with ease the tears that were streaking his rain-wet face. It made his own heart stutter with sympathy, and he squeezed the man’s hand again. 

“Fine me again, okay? I’ll play,” Clear said, “just for you.”

And with that he was off, ducking away as a guard lunged for him. He barely noticed as hands nearly grabbed him, suddenly aware that the part of him that was missing for so long had changed, a warmth blooming in its cold emptiness as he ran.

\---

The crowd dispersed with the same swiftness it had formed, Aoba left to stand alone in the rain, the umbrella at his side remaining unopened as the rain turned steady. He brought a hand up to wipe the tears from his cheeks, his vision blurred as his heart beat dizzyingly fast. That had been Clear, plain and simple. Once a body Aoba had seen bleeding out, Clear had returned.

Not as a memory or ghost, nothing more than an impression, but as himself. And as someone who seemed not to recognize Aoba.

With thunder rumbling in the distance and the chill of the oncoming storm setting into his bones, Aoba began to walk in the direction Clear had taken off in. He was going to find Clear. He needed to.


End file.
